your continued argumentation on this seems to demonstrate otherwise. Of course, the outcome of this case was more than a guilty/not guilty verdict---it was a settling of scores, after which a riot broke out. You can choose to ignore how proceedings increased tensions and assume "everybody would have rioted anyways"---but the fact is this was handled in a way that could only increase tensions, not decrease them. you could call me naive. I could call you cynical. In the end, we can all agree that proceedings were botched. you say it was politically-minded to reduce pressure---well, that certainly screwed up.
Like I have consistently maintained, my qualms are not with the legal outcome---they are with how proceedings went.
I agree with the bolded part, they did this in an effort to pacify a lynch mob which couldn't be pacified without imprisoning an innocent man. It would have been smarter to order a 7 o'clock curfew in order to clear the lynch mob off the streets and then announce the results of the grand jury at 9. Doing it that way would have saved the town, especially if the Governor allowed the national guard troops to help with the effort from the beginning. Instead, they made the mistake of treating the lynch mob as if it was a rational, intelligent body and made a plea towards reason, evidence and logic....we saw the results, the stepfather of the assailant ordered the mob to burn the town, and they complied.
If they didn't have a grand jury no evidence is presented for the public to see, no witness under oath, they really wouldn't release anything.
It's exactly what you argued for, only in other terms. You are unhappy that the prosecution actually laid out all evidence in the proceedings, when normally they would cherry pick and only lay out evidence that supports the case. I will always call you out on your BS. Remember that.
Do you think justice was served in this case? Simple, straightforward question. It either was or it wasn't. I'd like a yes or no answer. I don't care what your reasoning is, I want to know if you think that justice was served.
now if only they had a special prosecutor whose impartiality hadn't been questioned, and a more open process for something that was designed to be trial-like---and not just an ad hoc document dump.
Bolded is entirely your opinion on my opinion---which I feel like I have a stronger hold on. Given all that I have said about even more open proceedings, I cannot believe you still actually think I think this way. so I guess I will always call you out on your inability to read, and your need to play Freud when you can't read?
He is dodging the question because all he does is waste people's time with his ridiculously stupid rants.
Then when the prosecutor who had not already lost the community's trust announced something more than a settling of scores at nighttime after a proceeding nobody had full access to, and which reeked of special treatment beyond those accorded to criminal suspects---and if I might add after having police units assigned to protect predominantly white areas, but not black ones---the "inevitable" riot may not have been as bad or may not have happened. Attitudes would have less reason to harden in the community and outside of it. We wouldn't have people arguing for flawed legal proceedings that injected additional risk just because they feel like it's on "their side" to do so, and sing the good old chorus---this was "more than fair". It was "unusual"---in a good way. ^no way, san jose
Do I think there was enough evidence to convict? No. Do I think Wilson deserved jailtime or criminal liability? No. Do I think this case was bungled, mishandled, and done the wrong way? Yes, yes, and yes. Do I think justice was served? Yes, but in the wrong way. And in a nation of laws, that makes a big difference---a difference that strikes at the spirit and heart of the Constitution.
You'd just have people complaining that the special prosecutor was biased or that there was some kind of racism involved, or that it was a flawed system that led to annoying justice that wasn't wanted. Anyway thanks for explaining your point of view, it was interesting. That said, there was no reason whatsoever for those fools in the street to riot as it was, I think you give them WAY too much credit just like the prosecutor did when he appealed to reason, evidence, and logic rather than treating them like the morons that they clearly are.
Says the dude from Canada. But it's nice to see that you answered my question - and the only relevant one - the right way. I was expecting you to duck it, like you usually do. I'm a bit curious as to why a Canuck is so concerned with our legal process, given that your own legal processes are far less fair and do far less to protect the rights of the accused than our own, and all of your hand-wringing about processes that are different from your own is a tad strange. But at least you recognize justice when you see it. (Although I am still wondering why you think it's OK for a prosecutor to charge someone they believe tyo be innocent... Maybe that's a Canadian thing? I dunno, it's certainly not the American way )
Northside Storm seems to think that the prosecutors actually had decent options here. He seems to think that there could have been a decent outcome here where rioting could have been avoided while Wilson walked. Why he thinks this is mystifying, but that appears to be what we are dealing with here. He keeps saying that tensions would have been reduced if only the prosecutor proceeded differently. I have yet to see what he thinks would have actually unfolded if the prosecutor did whatever it is he wanted him to do. I think he doesn't understand how mobs - and this is most certainly a mob, not a peaceful protest - operate. I think he overestimates the capacity of this mob to think and behave in a rational way. He has given me no reason to even remotely believe that he understands these things. And I think he overestimates his own ability to understand the American system of justice and why it operates the way it does. But, he joins the mob in that regard - they don't get it either. Ducks in a pond...
American politics/law is a geeky sideline of mine--->so is interacting with people who think drastically differently from me.
->the "inevitable" riot may not have been as bad or may not have happened. http://www.vox.com/2014/11/25/7279783/protests-ferguson-fire a mob only becomes a mob in your head when you refuse to disambiguate sides and place everybody under a simple narrative. Peaceful protests didn't have to turn into a riot. It was the wrong person, at the wrong time, with the wrong proceeding---I'd like to see how you'd argue how that helped.
